Stephen Fry: The Liar

This is such a first novel. It has all the aspiration of a first novel, complete with an author who can write – and we KNOW he can write.

Unfortunately, the main character of this one – Adrian – is a bit of a bore, who lives up to every imaginable cliche associated with a public school boy, and the plot of The Liar only serves to confirm Adrian’s lack of ingenuity. But that of course is the point. Adrian has to be a fake.

The problem that this posed for me was that I was not sure why I wanted to go through the trouble of reading about Adrian. And then a number of sub-plots developed and we were introduced to the weird and delightful world of Adrian’s university tutor Donald Trefusis.

And a few pages further on, we were introduced to another sub-plot of espionage and another sub-plot of a Dickensian play within the story itself.

However, with all the sub-plots, none of which were developed to an engaging level, I lost interest in the story, and by the end of it have already forgotten much of what I read along the way.